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Alice in Wonderland (US - BD RA)

Gabe visits the colourful land of Tim Burton's Daddy and Marraige Issues...

Feature

An angst ridden nineteen year old Alice Kingsleigh is plagued by dreams of a strange world after the untimely death of her beloved father. Betrothed to the nebbish Hamish Ascot (Leo Bill), and confused about her future, Alice runs from the famous Lord Ascot’s garden party and tumbles down a rabbit hole. Though she’s hesitant to believe it, it turns out that Alice’s dreamland—or Wonderland—is real, and she’s immediately thrust into a dystopia ruled by the impassioned Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter). Wonderland’s heroes—the Cheshire Cat (Stephen Fry), the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp), the Caterpillar (Alan Rickman), the White Queen (Anne Hathaway), etc. – apparently have a plan, and it involves the returned Alice battling the Jabberwocky (Christopher Lee), a massive monster under the Red Queen’s control.

Having just recently reviewed the Blu-ray release of SyFy network’s Alice in Wonderland cash-in Alice, I’m going to repeat myself a bit here, because contextually speaking, both films save the same delude of adaptation history. Speaking in broad terms, Lewis Carroll’s ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ and ‘Through the Looking Glass’ are likely the most adapted non-religious stories in film history. Besides a massive pile of ‘official’ adaptations ( seventeen, including the Disney animated version, and the beautiful Czech-made mixed stop motion version), there is a long-standing tradition of films (and shorts) inspired by the basics of the texts, ranging from the obvious ( Labyrinth, Pan’s Labyrinth, Spirited Away, Mirror Mask), to the more abstract and conceptual (Roman Polanski’s What?, Wayne Kramer’s Running Scared, and even Clive Barker’s Hellraiser). The formula is so wide open to interpretation I could even argue Boogie Nights, Straw Dogs and Park Chan-wook’s Lady Vengeance count as loose adaptations.

To his credit (unlike the SyFy version) director Tim Burton avoids recalling The Matrix, which is probably the most prevalent unofficial Wonderland adaptation of the last two decades. Unfortunately, Burton is often stuck between the obnoxious, sickly sweet, candy-coated filmmaking that made Charlie and the Chocolate Factory such a chore, and misled bouts of melodrama. I enjoyed Sweeney Todd quite a bit, despite its director refusing to push himself at all creatively, and hoped the refocus on dark comedy would mean Burton had another Ed Wood in him. The announcement of Alice in Wonderland didn’t inspire any interest, and now that I’m actually watching the film I see my intuitions were mostly correct. This isn’t to say my intuitions are particularly incredible, rather they’re so un-incredible it’s a disappointment whenever I’m correct. Burton’s film is a semi-sequel to Carroll’s original stories, which would normally separate his version from a million other over-adapted properties, except that Steven Spielberg’s Hook, Walter Murch’s Return to Oz, and the SyFy channel Alice all already reintroduced their heroes and heroines to their respective Wonderlands after years away. Hook and Alice both erase the protagonist’s memories of Neverland and Wonderland as well. This puts Burton’s film at an off-the-bat conceptual disadvantage.

At its worst this Alice in Wonderland is a parody of the director’s filmography, including the emphasis on style over substance, the Hot Topic derivative visuals (which Burton seems to have defined over the years), and the out of place action sequences. Burton’s visual choices, his major advantage throughout his career lull ( Sweeney Todd notwithstanding), are hit and miss. The look is distinctive mix of cartoony computer animation, and live action costume drama (the early, real world bound scenes are probably as close as we’ll see Burton get to adapting Pride and Prejudice, and I kind of liked it), which I’m not sure has ever been achieved as effectively, or at least as smoothly. The mixed media approach reminds me of some of the anime inspired cult films out of Hong Kong and Japan ( Great Yokai War, for instance), but Burton’s budget allows him to blur the line a little more gracefully. Camera movement is a little slow and sleepy for Burton, who still screws in a few mega-cartoony zooms, but mostly apes Peter Jackson aping David Lean. At best Burton doesn’t quite match Andrew Adamson aping Peter Jackson. The last act focus on epic battle scene is disconcerting as well, inspiring basically zero zeal. The big climax feels uncommonly small, as if enacted on a Dinner Theatre stage rather than an IMAX screen, and is followed by a terribly placating dance scene.

The film’s comedic dialogue works much better than anticipated, but every clever quip is forced to fight its way through huge swaths of unnecessary exposition. The screenwriters—who must have had all of a week to prep the script—earn credit for trying to do something new with such overly familiar elements, but there’s a random quality to the storytelling, and the speedy pacing allows for little investment. I never thought to care about the Mad Hatter’s back story, and the film does little to convince me otherwise (the last thing the already over-adapted tale needed was text book selections from ‘The Hero’s Journey’). Worse is the inclusion of the director’s two favourite bits of neuroses—daddy issues and fear of marriage. One assumes he’s going to shoehorn them into every film from here on out, culminated I Can’t Marry You, Because I Have Creepy Daddy Issues. Perhaps after this masterpiece he’ll move on to making movies that feature a lasting impact. Concerning the Alice in Wonderland cast, Johnny Depp, the trailers’ main selling point, is a waste, apparently content to mix all his most United Kingdom accented back catalogue. His CG augmented eyes are consistently distracting as well. Fortunately the rest of the cast is quite charming, especially Helena Bonham Carter as the insecure and impulsive Red Queen (an amalgamation of the book’s Red Queen and Queen of Hearts), and Anne Hathaway as a deep down villainous White Queen doing her best to act proper.

Video

As per their other Disney Digital 3D release, Disney has chosen not to include an anaglyph 3D version of Alice in Wonderland with this collection. From what I’ve heard from people that saw the film in theatres the post-production 3D was so wonky a polarized 3D version wouldn’t have been ideal anyway. What fans do get is a very pretty 1.78:1 1080p transfer. The basic look of Wonderland is a massive mix of post-production trick. It’s as if the chroma levels have been cranked as high as they can go, then all the details were digitally sharpened, then everything was de-saturated, and then put through the bleach-bypass process. Part of the look is the softness, and the softness does not, surprisingly enough lead to a lot of particularly sharp edges, or high contrast…erm, contrasts. There are still plenty of incredible details to explore, especially in the costumes, and the hairs of the CG creatures (so many kinds of hair). The White Queen’s domain is sharper than everything else, thanks to the almost black and white look, while the Red Queen’s domain is the most visually appealing thanks to the duelling blacks and reds. The warmer colours and super-deep black levels are the transfer’s most impressive element, but the basically thin and soft nature of the film’s non-close-up visuals, though intended, keeps the disc just this side of must-see status.

Audio

The second Alice physically steps into Wonderland the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 erupts into the stereo and surround channels. Future sequences within the kingdom are a little more traditional in terms of quantity, but this intro features some extremely aggressive with buzzing, bustling creatures, zipping all about the channels. Other effects-heavy highlights include any scenes involving the Bandgersnatch, the crowd scene during the Hatter’s beheading, and the Jabberwocky battle. The animated vocal cast is a particular thrill, and all the male voices produce great, sharp bass, especially Sir Christopher Lee as the Jabberwocky. The thespian’s baritone certainly rattles the LFE. The majority of the uncompressed track’s efforts seem to go into Danny Elfman’s score. The music is a semi-return to Elfman’s earlier Burton scores, especially the Batman and Batman Returns scores, which are probably the most robust in the composer’s catalogue. Alice in Wonderland features a bit of the whimsy of Sleepy Hallow as well, including a nice hero’s theme that features a chorus of boys singing actual English lyrics.

Extras

The terse extras are divided into a few subsections. The five part ‘Wonderland Characters’ (27:50, HD) featurette starts things off. ‘Finding Alice’ starts things off with a general look behind the scenes, where all the cast and crew members give each other back-pats, and explain the obvious subtext. The focus is generally thrust upon Alice, including casting, wardrobe, and fight training. ‘The Mad Hatter’ shifts focus to Depp, who discusses his method, his and Burton’s designs, make-up, costume and digital eye augmentation. ‘The Futterwacken Dance’ discusses the worst thing in the film, and how it came together. ‘The Red Queen’ is a rather entertaining look at the villain with Helena Bonham Carter, who’s make-up took forever, and who looks more interesting without the digitally embiggened head. This is followed by a time-lapse look at the Red Queen’s make-up set to commentary by Carter, Burton, and the make-up designers. ‘The White Queen’ closes out the section with a look at Anne Hathaway’s amalgamation character, who is the most consistently funny member of the cast.

‘Making Wonderland’ (19:30, HD) begins with ‘Scoring Wonderland’, a reasonably informative look at the production of Danny Elfman’s music, especially the main hero theme. ‘Effecting Wonderland’ explores all the styles of digital effects and animation that went into the technically complex film, like motion capture, green screen composition, head replacement, character animation, etc. ‘Stunts of Wonderland’ speaks for itself, and features some amusing green screen footage. ‘Making the Proper Size’ continues the look at the special effects, specifically those that pertain to Alice’s varying sizes. ‘Cakes of Wonderland’ quickly covers the baking of the film’s various prop cakes, follow-up by a brief look at the rest of the tea party props. Trailers for other Disney Blu-ray and DVD releases close out the disc.

Overall

Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland isn’t the garish mess I thought it would be, but it does see the director on cruise control, and is just generally not a very good movie. The performances and humour are enough to entertain, and they almost overcome the disjointed plotting, but the emphasis on goofy special effects and tired production design kicks things back down again. This Blu-ray release looks and sounds great, though the super-stylized visuals don’t lend themselves to the sharpest details, and Danny Elfman’s bombastic score usually takes command of the DTS-HD Master Audio track. The extras are pretty brief, and smell like sales pieces, but are actually quite efficient and informative for what they are.

*Note: The images on this page are not representative of the Blu-ray release.

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bored wrote: feel alone in saying thing, but I liked this movie. loved the crazy rabbit, loved the cat, loved the mouse and really loved the score. people can scoff and look down on me like i'm some lower intelligent being but I don't care and not planning to anytime soon.

charming movie. don't know what people were expecting. it's suppose to be weird. and the music for the first Absolem sequence is sublime. that sliding choir and strings was amazing. between this, and the upcoming "Airbender" and "Inception" movie, filmmusic geeks should have a great 2010.

Well as far as 2010 goes, if there's one movie that I would like to see, it'd be Toy Story 3.

feel alone in saying thing, but I liked this movie. loved the crazy rabbit, loved the cat, loved the mouse and really loved the score. people can scoff and look down on me like i'm some lower intelligent being but I don't care and not planning to anytime soon.

charming movie. don't know what people were expecting. it's suppose to be weird. and the music for the first Absolem sequence is sublime. that sliding choir and strings was amazing. between this, and the upcoming "Airbender" and "Inception" movie, filmmusic geeks should have a great 2010.

Phil92 wrote: People clapped when Johnny Depp first came on screen in my showing. Also, people clapped before, during and after New Moon at my screening.

I would be clapping at neither these movies.

Chris Gould wrote: hogaburger wrote: To top it off, Depp's futterwagon dance made me pretty much want to kill myself and everybody in my theater who clapped at it. Do people actually do that? They do realise that the people on screen can't hear them, right?

Well they're fanpeople Chris. There's not much to do, I'm afraid.

And hogaburger, I really hated Johnny Depp's performance as The Mad Hatter. It was really disgusting compared to Willy Wonka. Though I like Johnny Depp as an actor, I thought this movie was one of the worst Disney and Tim Burton remakes ever. I don't even believe why this made $1 billion. I understand you very well, it's a piece of s**t.

The only time we have been in a non-festival cinema and people clapped was when we were watching Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade (a movie we can't stand) and some dickhead next to us started clapping at the sequence where the German plane overtakes the Jones in the tunnel.

You Brits have no idea. Here in the midwest of America at least a dozen people clap at the end of pretty much every film I've been to in a year, save the ones where there was no one else in the theater but me, like The Road (and really, if you clap at the end of The Road, you probably need to be placed in the reality of The Road). The only time I thought it was really earned was Drag Me to Hell, which is a film that basically begs the audience to talk to it.

Chris Gould wrote: Do people actually do that? They do realise that the people on screen can't hear them, right?

Depressingly, some audiences DO that. It's ridiculous and only wankers do it. OK, you can appreciate the artistry involved, but don't f**king clap, as it looks absurd!

We have absolutely NO interest in watching this movie; Burton lost it a LONG time ago and pretty much everything since Ed Wood (a movie which though entertaining, plays it fast & loose with the truth) has been either patchy or flat-out b0ll0cks.

watcha talkin bout willis? like they literally CGI'ed in his eyes? i ask because all the photos and footage i've seen looks like typical contact lenses. there's even the common problem of the eyes being uneven sometimes because the contacts aren't sitting properly.

or is that actually a wanted look done by CGI?

The contacts were indeed made to sit improperly in one eye, but then they made the eyes like 25% bigger with CG in post. It's not in the poster images or production photos, and I don't believe it's in the trailer either. Once I noticed it I was terribly distracted.

Chris Gould wrote: hogaburger wrote: To top it off, Depp's futterwagon dance made me pretty much want to kill myself and everybody in my theater who clapped at it. Do people actually do that? They do realise that the people on screen can't hear them, right?

You overestimate the intelligence of the teenage Hot Topic girl crowd.

Bouncy X wrote: Depp's CGI eyes?

watcha talkin bout willis? like they literally CGI'ed in his eyes? i ask because all the photos and footage i've seen looks like typical contact lenses. there's even the common problem of the eyes being uneven sometimes because the contacts aren't sitting properly.

or is that actually a wanted look done by CGI?

I think the unevenness is intentional. And stupid looking. Either way, it's definitely got a digital tweak to it. Somebody took the fish-eye effect and applied it liberally:

watcha talkin bout willis? like they literally CGI'ed in his eyes? i ask because all the photos and footage i've seen looks like typical contact lenses. there's even the common problem of the eyes being uneven sometimes because the contacts aren't sitting properly.

hogaburger wrote: To top it off, Depp's futterwagon dance made me pretty much want to kill myself and everybody in my theater who clapped at it. Do people actually do that? They do realise that the people on screen can't hear them, right?

triply wrote: There is a lot of resentment of Burton since The Planet of the Apes fiasco, but I still find his movies interesting to watch.

I do think it's a bit of a stretch saying Hellraiser, Boogie Nights and Lady Vengeance inspired by Alice in Wonderland.

Personally I'm perfectly willing to ignore Planet of the Apes, but everything since has bored me, except Sweeney Todd. In fact, I kind of respect Burton having done Apes because it's nothing like his other movies. He tried, failed, and retreated into making the same movie over and over.

Also, I suppose Hellraiser II is more of an Alice in Wonderland story, but any story where an innocent is placed in a world they don't understand, and meet a series of strange characters, owes something to the story. Lady Vengeance's prison scenes, and the bulk of Boogie Nights fill this trope, though both stories diverge.

"The Nightmare Before Christmas" was not directed by Burton. A lot of people seem to forget that. Poor Henry Selick!

My favourite Tim Burton movie of recent times is Big Fish. I never tire of watching it! I liked Sweeny Todd, but wouldn't watch it again. I am just not that into musicals.

Coming to Alice in Wonderland, I couldn't catch it on the big screen, but I will watch it on DVD. There is a lot of resentment of Burton since The Planet of the Apes fiasco, but I still find his movies interesting to watch.

I do think it's a bit of a stretch saying Hellraiser, Boogie Nights and Lady Vengeance inspired by Alice in Wonderland.

I am another one that didn't enjoy this movie. It really wasn't the "Alice in Wonderland" you would grow up and love. It's an irrelevant story that was given this title. I had to see it again for a party and boy, did it get worse or what? Tim Burton manages to direct many great movies like "The Nightmare Before Christmas" and "Edward Scissorhands," but this sucked like s**t. I would rather watch "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" instead, because that was much, much better.

This is the only movie in recent years that I have genuinely loathed to my core. It just rubbed me the wrong way in every way possible. I don't mind it being a little abstract given the subject matter, but this movie actually tried to have a story and failed miserably at it. And the CGI just made every character disturbingly soulless to me.

To top it off, Depp's futterwagon dance made me pretty much want to kill myself and everybody in my theater who clapped at it. Doubly so when Alice did her version later. Argghahhgag.